Businesses with outdoor service areas, such as gasoline service stations, are improving the facilities and areas around them. These companies want to keep their places of business attractive to their customers, keep the appearances comparable to other businesses, and also make the facilities better illuminated and safer in non-daylight hours.
Service stations in particular today are improving the areas around the gasoline pumping areas by installing canopies over them that are well illuminated and provide an attractive appearance. A number of these canopies have signs, lights, or illuminated faces along the fascias.
An improved system for illuminating canopy fascias of this type is disclosed, for example, in commonly-owned U.S. Pat. No. 5,381,324 entitled "Illuminated Canopy System." In that system, a decorative flexible sheet member is stretched across the face of each of the canopy fascias and held in place on an elongated frame structure. A plurality of lights, such as metal halide lights, are provided inside the fascias to distribute light on the face of the sign panel. Preferably, a light dispersion film is placed over the light sources in order to uniformly distribute the light. Also, trim caps and other housing members are provided to complete the external structure of the fascia "lightbox" device.
Other illuminated canopy systems feature use of fluorescent lamps to light the sign panels. The present invention can be used with these systems as well. In addition, the present invention can be used with non-illuminated fascia or sign systems, since it relates generally to the stretching and securing of flexible panels.
Installing the flexible sheet member on the face of the lightbox or other fascia structure can be a time consuming and difficult procedure. The canopy fascias are typically positioned approximately 15-25 feet above the ground, making them difficult to access. In addition, the flexible face sheets or panel members often are 20, 40 or even 100 or more feet in length and need to be applied as a single sheet for structural and aesthetic purposes. The sheet members also need to be installed under tension in all directions. Moreover, the flexible face sign panels are typically decorated with delicate materials which require special handling so that they will not be bent or creased which might affect the aesthetics or integrity of the final product.
Known methods for installing flexible face sign panels have included simple manual handling and stretching, applying the sign panels to the frame in the factory before it is sent to the site, as well as the use of a freely movable dolly. With the latter system, the flexible sign panel is rolled up from each end like a scroll. The installation of the sign panel proceeds from the center of the canopy fascia outwardly toward each end. Although the latter procedure works satisfactorily, it still is labor intensive, requires manual stretching and tensioning of the sign panel, and requires significant skill in aligning the pattern on the sign panel with the canopy fascia.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an improved method and apparatus for installing a flexible face sign panel on a canopy fascia structure. It is another object of the present invention to provide a system for stretching and tensioning the flexible face sign panel on a canopy fascia as it is being installed.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide an improved trolley and frame system for installing a flexible face sign panel, the trolley having improved ease of movement, improved installation and removal of rolls of the sheet material, and improved installation of the sheet material on the canopy fascia. It is a still further object of the present invention to provide an improved system for stretching and tensioning flexible face sign panels during installation which is more efficient, less costly and simpler and easier to use than known methods.
These and other objects, features, and advantages of the invention will become apparent from the following description of the invention and appended claims, when viewed in accordance with the attached drawings.